FILE -- Indiana Pacers forward Paul George (13) reacts after missing a three-point shot that would have ties the game in the final seconds in the second half of their NBA playoff basketball game Sunday, April 23, 2017, afternoon at Bankers Life Fieldhouse. The Pacers lost to the Cavaliers 106-102.(Photo11: Matt Kryger/IndyStar)Buy Photo

INDIANAPOLIS – At least now, the Indiana Pacers get it. For the past year, regardless of who’s been in charge, they’ve completely missed the Paul George story even as it was obvious what their transparently homesick superstar was thinking.

What was he thinking? Goodbye.

While other teams were being proactive entering the historically talent-rich 2017 NBA draft – most notably building behemoth Boston in the Eastern Conference – the Pacers stayed asleep. As they've been for years, as it relates to Paul George.

Who's been in charge of the Pacers, anyway? Ichabod Crane?

Well, they’re out of bed now. After snoozing through so many alarms – my God, it’s been deafening – the Pacers were jolted awake by a bucket of cold water from George’s agent, Aaron Mintz, who reportedly has told Pacers President Kevin Pritchard that George will not re-sign when he becomes a free agent after the 2017-18 season. Mintz told Pritchard, according to a league source, that he prefers to play …

This would be funny, if it weren’t so infuriating. The previous Pacers president, Larry Bird, knew going into the 2017 trade deadline that Paul George wasn’t going to re-sign with the Pacers if he didn’t think they were ready to win. George said just that to a radio show a week before the trade deadline in February, and what he said on the radio was actually George paraphrasing what he’d already told Larry Bird directly:

“As I told Larry,” George said to ESPN Radio in February, “I always want to play on a winning team. … Say what you want; I want to compete for something. It's frustrating just playing the game for stats or for numbers or to showcase yourself. Man, I want a chance to play for a chance to win a championship.”

That wasn’t Paul George encouraging Bird, who managed to build a 2016-17 roster with exactly zero notable assets, to go build a contender around him in 12 months. That was George telling Bird: I’m leaving, so you might want to trade me first.

Not sure what Bird heard back then, because he didn’t (A) trade George or (B) acquire someone to help George. Instead, Bird (C) did nothing at the 2017 trade deadline, then a few months later retired. Bird kicked the can to his replacement, Kevin Pritchard.

Paul George has been with the Indiana Pacers for seven seasons. Here are his honors and averages
Scott Horner/IndyStar

And now it’s Pritchard who looks naïve. He’s been in the big chair since May 1, the Paul George decision the only one that matters, and in the ensuing seven weeks he has done one concrete thing on that front: He had dinner with Paul George the night after his introductory news conference, telling him that the mediocre, asset-less Pacers were determined to build a winner around him. Meanwhile, the No. 1 and No. 3 picks in the upcoming draft already have been swapped, and it appears the Boston Celtics are working on a trade to acquire Jimmy Butler from Chicago. It appears they’re planning to pair him with former Butler star Gordon Hayward, a free agent from Utah whom the Celtics hope to reunite with his college coach, Brad Stevens.

Don’t get me started on Paul George’s comments on Thursday before the Caroline Symmes Celebrity Softball Challenge at Victory Field, where he said nothing, and I mean absolutely nothing, that should have been construed as: I’m staying.

He did say: “I’m under contract. That’s all that needs to really be known.”

He did say: “I’m here. I’m a Pacer.”

And he did say, quite clearly: “I’m a Pacer. There’s no way around that.”

I’m a Pacer. There’s no way around that.

CLOSE

Indiana Pacer Paul George says he will stay with Indiana under his continuing contract with the Pacers for the 2017-18 season, despite rumors of being traded in the 2017 NBA draft to teams such as the Cleveland Cavaliers. (June 15, 2017)
Jenna Watson/IndyStar

And Pacers fans are mad today at George for seemingly going back on what he said Thursday? Man, they ought to be thanking him for giving the Pacers the hard truth. At Victory Field, that was Paul George doing what he has done for months. That was him saying it, without saying it: As soon as this contract is over, I’m gone.

But, no. Pacers fans heard: I’m staying! Which is understandable. When we’re fans, we think with our hearts, not our heads. We’re the Scarecrow, not the Tin Man. All ticker.

But Bird or Pritchard or whoever’s been calling the shots at Bankers Life Fieldhouse – that you, Scarecrow? – has been hearing what he wanted to hear, not the actual noise. It’s like nobody in charge has been paying attention to Paul George since he started to emerge as a star during the 2014 NBA playoffs. George has been all about his brand in a blatant way, and there’s nothing wrong with that.

But there is something wrong with the Pacers missing it.

Because, look. If you’re Paul George and you’re all about your brand, odds are you would prefer a major media market to our charmingly humble home here. Like, say, Los Angeles.

And what do you know? Paul George is from Los Angeles.

The signs were there. They’ve always been there. But after the Pacers have shown impossibly poor reading comprehension on words written between the lines, Paul George apparently has instructed his agent to write it in bold, and in all caps:

BYE.

So the Pacers, who have never had much leverage to trade George, now must trade him with almost none. The Lakers aren’t about to give the Pacers anything good for George; he’s coming anyway. And every other team in the NBA? They’re not going to give the Pacers anything approaching market value for him, because they know – assuming they’ve been paying closer attention than the Pacers front office to the Pacers’ best player – that he’s probably a one-year rental.

Well done, Larry Bird. And you, Kevin Pritchard. Way to miss the essence of Paul George. Way to miss the obviously closing, now completely shut window to salvage your franchise. Way to doom the Pacers to irrelevance for the foreseeable future.

Oh, but please forgive that earlier Sleepy Hollow reference. I don’t really think the Pacers have been run by Ichabod Crane.